Please submit only technical tips that will help other TidBITS readers better use their Macs, iPhones, iPads, and related software and hardware. All product announcements should be sent to releases@tidbits.com.

Tip title*

Your tip*

URL

Enter the URL to a Web page that supports your tip.

Linked text

Enter the name of the page linked above.

Your name*

Your email*

* indicates required fields

To help us avoid automated posts and spam, please enter the words below.

When you submit a tip, you give us permission to use it. Read our terms for more details. All submissions are reviewed before publication.

Our terms: By submitting a tip, you agree to assign TidBITS Publishing Inc., a non-exclusive, worldwide, perpetual license to reproduce, publish, and distribute your tip in connection with the TidBITS Web site and associated products in any media. You agree that you created the content you submitted, and that you have the right to assign us this license. You give us permission to use your name, but your email address won't be publicly displayed or shared. We review all submissions before publication, and reserve the right to select which submissions we feel are appropriate for our readers and to edit those we publish.

Our terms: We reserve the right to edit or delete any comment, so please post thoughtfully. We use your email address only to send you a one-time verification message confirming that you posted this comment. We also store your address to allow you to verify using other Web browsers in the future. For more info, see our privacy policy.

Find Which Applications Phone Home with VirusBarrier X6

Worried about rogue applications or spyware "phoning home" with your private data? Turn on VirusBarrier's Anti-Spyware feature, and it will alert you to applications that attempt to connect to remote servers. Once you know which apps are phoning home, you can block or allow each individually, and you can even block or allow specific ports for each application, to ensure that your private data stays private.

MacBook Air Loses Hard Drive and Debuts at $999

Apple’s smallest laptop model, the MacBook Air, has long been due for an update, and as the “one more thing” part of last week’s media event, the new models didn’t disappoint. That’s right, “models,” plural, since the MacBook Air now comes in two sizes: one with the traditional 13.3-inch screen, and an even smaller and lighter unit with an 11.6-inch screen. (Jeff Carlson was on site for Apple’s event—he edited this article via in-flight Wi-Fi on a new 11-inch MacBook Air while he flew back from California—and he’ll have more hands-on details soon.)

The 13-inch MacBook Air sports an aluminum unibody construction that’s incredibly thin, measuring just 0.68 inches (1.72 cm) at the thickest side by the screen hinge, and tapering to 0.11 inches (0.28 cm). It’s also lighter, dropping 0.1 pound (45 g) to 2.9 pounds (1.31 kg). It’s powered by a 1.86 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo processor with 6 MB of on-chip shared L2 cache and a 1066 MHz frontside bus; a 2.13 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo with the same cache is
available as an option. The resolution of its 13.3-inch screen is 1440 by 900 pixels. Apple claims 7 hours of “wireless productivity” battery life and up to 30 days of standby time, as if you’d let your shiny new Mac sit unused that long.

The 11-inch MacBook Air drops to 2.3 pounds (1.06 kg), and also loses a full 1 inch of width and 1.38 inches of depth to clock in at 11.8 inches (29.95 cm) wide and 7.56 inches (19.2 cm) deep. On the processor side, you can get either a 1.4 GHz or 1.6 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo with 3 MB of L2 cache and an 800 MHz frontside bus. Its 11.6-inch screen, while obviously small, has an amazing resolution of 1366 by 768 pixels. The 11-inch model’s smaller battery claims a still-impressive 5 hours of wireless productivity life and the same 30 days of standby time.

All four models offer only solid-state storage for persistent memory—there’s no hard drive, nor even space for one! The 11-inch model comes in 64 GB and 128 GB varieties, while the 13-inch Air is available in 128 GB and 256 GB versions. This flash memory isn’t packaged as a swap-in hard drive replacement, like most solid-state drives (SSDs), where the shape and package looks like a standard laptop drive. Rather, the memory is arrayed on cards that are permanently installed. You can’t upgrade it—although you never know if a third party will figure out a solution later. (The folks at iFixit disassembled a MacBook Air and found that there
is an SSD controller inside, however, which makes a computer think that the memory it’s talking to is a hard drive.)

In both sizes, 2 GB of RAM is standard, but you can bump that to 4 GB for $100 at the time you order; note that you cannot install RAM after purchase. Other standard features include the FaceTime video camera, two USB 2.0 ports (which are flush with the edges, no small flip-down door as found in the previous generations), a Mini DisplayPort, headphone jack, built-in microphone, stereo speakers, and a MagSafe adapter. Both also have Nvidia GeForce 320M graphics adapters with 256 MB of DDR3 SDRAM shared with main memory. On the networking side, both sport 802.11n AirPort Extreme wireless networking and Bluetooth 2.1 + EDR; the Apple USB Ethernet adapter is sold separately. The 13-inch model also has room for an SD card slot. In a
particularly nice feature, Apple now ships a USB Software Reinstall Drive to help if and when you need to reinstall Mac OS X. That’s handier, more compact, and more durable than a DVD—and no second computer is required for the reinstallation.

Pricing is impressive, and leads one to wonder how long the white polycarbonate MacBook will remain in the lineup. The 11-inch MacBook Air with a 1.4 GHz CPU, 64 GB of storage, and 2 GB of RAM checks in at $999. Increasing the storage to 128 GB bumps the price to $1,199. Switching to a 1.6 GHz CPU adds $100, as does increasing the RAM to 4 GB.

The 13-inch model starts at $1,299 for a 1.86 GHz CPU, 128 GB of storage, and 2 GB of RAM. For $1,599, you can increase the storage to 256 GB, and once again, increasing the CPU speed to 2.13 GHz adds $100 to the price, as does going to 4 GB of RAM. (And you really, really want at least 4 GB of RAM, especially in a machine you can’t upgrade. Trust us on this.)

READERS LIKE YOU! Support TidBITS by becoming a member today!Check out the perks at <http://tidbits.com/member_benefits.html>Special thanks to George Chase, Donald Lacer, Karen Kirtland, and
Desmond Yip for their generous support!

Comments about MacBook Air Loses Hard Drive and Debuts at $999(Comments are closed.)

Would the next MacOS Lion be delivered on an USB stick too? Without a DVD drive how will I be able to upgrade a MBA I'd buy now to MacOS Lion next year? Maybe I should wait and buy only next year a MBA?

Will the 'harddrive' show performance degration once it gets filled up? Flash memory that contains 'trashed' files has to be erased in one pass and then written in a second pass, which is always slower than when the memory cells are 'clean'.So when you delete a file, will OSX erase the information or merely remove the directory entry?

MacBook Air is an iPad replacement for those who don't like all that exposed glass, and have money to burn. It can't seriously replace the MacBook since it has no optical drive and needs another Mac for missing functions, just like the iPad. The least Apple could have done is put an SD card slot. I wouldn't buy either one. They're too limited. For those who do mostly surfing, email, basic games, video, fine. MacBook Air is an overpriced, under powered, accessory that's has fewer features than a netbook the same size for half the price. Skinny and pretty isn't enough. Big disappointment.